Rumen ciliates modulate methane emissions in ruminants
Rumen ciliates are major contributors to enteric methane emissions from ruminant animals, yet the underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood. We present a catalog of 450 rumen ciliate genomes, with 87% newly generated. Using this resource, we quantified methane emissions from 100 cows and analyzed 1877 rumen metagenomic and metatranscriptomic datasets, which revealed correlations among ciliate abundance, methanogen abundance, and methane emissions. We further demonstrated that taxon-specific effects of rumen ciliates on methane production arise from a single-membrane, hydrogen-producing organelle called the hydrogenobody (HB), which is distinct from canonical hydrogenosomes in other protists. HBs are positioned near ciliary basal bodies and harbor specific hydrogenases and oxygen reductases. We found that Vestibuliferida ciliates, which have more abundant HBs than do Entodiniomorphida, exhibit enhanced hydrogen production and oxygen-scavenging capacity, thereby strongly promoting methanogenesis.
Authors
- Jinying He
- Chuanqi Jiang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8593-6996)
- Che Hu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2987-5252)
- M Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0006-2920-0454)
- Huazhe Si (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4721-5047)
- Ying Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1312-0146)
- Yujia Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6777-2804)
- Kaizhen Guo
- Weiwei Qin (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2872-257X)
- Xiaoting Yan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7114-3223)
- Xia Gao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0001-0480-1468)
- Zan Huang
- Jinmei Feng
- Wei Miao
- Yang Xiao
- Qinhui Xu
- Limei Lin
- Zhipeng Li
- Luqin Zheng
- Weiyun Zhu
- Kai Chen
- Rong Wang
- Xiaocui Chai
- Yuan Xiao
- Rui Du
- Wen Wang
- Guangying Wang
- Wei Jin
- Shengyong Mao
- Qiang Qiu
- Jie Xiong
- Fei Xie
- Jing Zhang
- Xiji Shu
- Le Luo Guan
Institutions
- Nanjing Agricultural University (CN)
- University of British Columbia (CA)
- Northwestern Polytechnical University (CN)
- Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
- Peking University (CN)
- Jianghan University (CN)
- Institute of Hydrobiology (CN)
- Institute of Subtropical Agriculture (CN)
- Shanghai Zhangjiang Laboratory (CN)
- Jilin Agricultural University (CN)
- Center for Life Sciences (CN)
- University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Science
- Published
- 2026-04-30
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adv4244
- Primary Topic
- Ruminant Nutrition and Digestive Physiology
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Natural Science Foundation of Jilin Province
- National Natural Science Foundation of China
- National Key Research and Development Program of China